Wild camping, Scotland

By Christopher BurleyThe shadows began to stretch towards the beach, so we climbed a rocky promontory to watch the sun set over the Outer Hebrides. Among the sea lochs we spotted a lone kayak, drifting between the lonely islets; below us, a pair of otters frolicked in the shallow water. We were at the legendary "wild" campsite at Sheigra and had finally found the Scotland we'd come looking for.

A week earlier we had picked up a 4x4 campervan – the gloriously compact Mazda Bongo – from Campers Scotland in Alloa. We had come to Scotland determined to experience some wild nature and were happy to find ourselves driving through majestic Glen Coe to our first campsite. It was great to spend our first night under the stars but the site was crowded with campers locked inside their vast mobile homes – blue TV light glaring through the windows.

Next day we pushed on along the Great Glen, catching glimpses of beauty between tour buses. It was while we were parked outside the monolithic Loch Ness Experience that we met Richard, a fellow Bongo driver, who told us about "the beach" (or rather the hundreds of beaches along the west coast where you can wild camp) and showed us Sheigra on the map. Wild camping was not normal camping, he said, but camping without water supply or other facilities, and it was completely legal in Scotland.

Sheigra is in the far north-west. At the end of the Kinlochbervie road you find an old track with a notice that reads: "Please donate £2 to the community. Put it in the pot by the old caravan." The site sits in a narrow cove before a perfect white sandy beach. There were three small campervans already there, all with kayaks strapped to the roof. We set up camp – fold-up table and chairs, simple stove and cool box for the day's fresh fish.

A friendly village man came to chat, and we asked if he was a crofter. "No," he laughed. "During the winter I work for the council, driving a snowplough. There's no' much work in the summer." There are few people in the outer reaches of Britain and it seems all company is cherished, with most tourists treated as visiting friends.

Sheigra was just the start of our trip. We took the A838 south, through secluded bays and around lonely mountains, from one perfect village to the next. On the Glenelg peninsula, we wild-camped by the loch among wild deer. In the morning we hiked up Beinn Sgritheall and watched the weather: blue skies over the Torridons to the north; sheets of rain over Skye; swirling, dark clouds over the Knoydart peninsula to south.

That evening we treated ourselves to an excellent seafood supper in the Glenelg Inn before returning to our faithful Mazda Bongo for a dram. I fell asleep to the lapping of Loch Horn and dreamt of kayaking through the empty waters. Next time, we'll have boats strapped to the Bongo.

Genteel squalor, Ireland

By Jowi Hewitt It was getting dark and a little foggy. B&B signs had become few, and those we tried were full. So we were relieved to find a lovely Victorian house overlooking a lake. Mrs R, the landlady, had first been reluctant, but mum eventually captured her heart with emotive woes of travelling, the fog, no other vacancies to be found.

Liking to travel cheap, mum would not have been put off by the genteel squalor and stale food smell in the once-grand hallway, but had no patience with me saying, "Will there be an internet connection?" Her view? "As long as the room is clean and there's hot water. We're only here overnight." So she waited with a pot of tea in the hallway, while they got the room ready and plied me with conciliatory cans of beer. Mrs R bellowed down the kitchen serving shaft for Mr R to send up its lift with some clean sheets.

Mrs R passed us, helping a very old man shuffle down the stairs. Agitated, he came close and peered, with his always-open, tooth-free mouth struggling to talk. We did get that he wanted his glasses and teeth. Mum, now in social-worker mode, recognised Alzheimer's and got him laughing by saying we were not there to pinch them and would give them back if we came across them.

The bedroom was also shabby, as expected, and mum's nose wrinkled as she went into the bathroom. But my bed's clean sheets had been turned down, over a hot-water bottle that I curled around.

I woke to the sickly smell of my pillow. Mum still dressed, bed not disturbed, looked fraught. She pointed to the old man's glasses in the drawer of the bedside table. Then she whispered that there were teeth in a glass in the bathroom.

Musical craic Blacksod, Ireland

By Adrian Hall Blacksod is at the end of a 12-mile tongue that dangles off the western Irish coast. My wife and I drove here on a torrential Sunday in August, having booked a one-night stay at the Leim Siar B&B. When we booked, Hannah, our hostess, had emailed us: "Are you aware we are out on the tip of the Mullet Peninsula?" That was fine. We had come looking for a taste of remote Atlantic Gaeltacht.

Photograph: Adrian Hall

A line of houses front the road above the strand line. The shore is a scythe of raw sand and stone. On the Point there's a small quay and the squat, square lighthouse from which the D-Day weather forecast was dispatched to England.

When we arrived the locals were gathered by the jetty, watching Curragh racing. Sleek clinker-built boats with crews of three men apiece were being rowed in heats along the bay and back, while dogs chased each other on the sand. Racing proceeded fitfully as heavy showers came and passed. We combed the bare beach in the wind and rain.

By mid-afternoon the storm had passed, and we were left with a wind-scrubbed blue sky. We walked up to the standing stone spiral that conjures mystery on the boggy, stone-strewn moor and we lingered with a pony whose golden mane was like a woman's hair.

That evening, Hannah knocked on our door. We shouldn't stay in, she told us. There was music in the local pubs, in honour of the races: modern in the next village, traditional in the local, a couple of doors down. Just after 10pm we approached the pub: a modern bungalow, looking for all the world like someone's house, with no hint of a Guinness advert or inn sign. The bar room was austere and almost empty, but we were greeted by three ancients in a corner as if they saw us every day. We ordered half a Guinness and a Jameson, thinking the night could be short.

But people trickled in, and soon a group of musicians appeared: banjo, guitar, tin whistle, accordion, harp. Every seat and most of the standing room was filled. Talk and laughter warmed the room. When the singer struck up with her clear voice and the musicians followed her, the loose assortment of people was transformed into an almost tribal musical communion. Now and then one quiet young man would be moved to get up and dance a jig. Drink was taken slowly as everyone hung on the words and notes of an air, or put their heart into a refrain.

We had crammed into tourist pubs elsewhere in Ireland, straining to hear the tunes above the chatter, but this was different: an easy gathering of young and old. We were the only outsiders. My wife was drawn into conversation by a white-haired old gent beside her who, like so many Irishmen, had laboured in England and returned home. The earlier pub had burned down, we learned, as we listened to his tragic account of the landlady and her family: a tale worthy of a ballad.

At last the music and the singing drew to a reluctant close and, after a decent pause, people began to leave. We stepped out into the night, under a silent, star-dusted sky, remarking on our good fortune that our one night in distant Blacksod should coincide with such company.

• The 12 readers whose pieces are published here will be entered into a draw to win a long weekend for two in Istanbul, courtesy of Hotels.com and Turkish Airlines. The prize includes three nights at the five-star Movenpick Istanbul and flights form London. The winner's name will be published in Escape next week.

•· This article was amended on Wednesday 30 December 2009. The article was wrongly headlined Readers write: top 2009 trips in the UK. This should have read Readers write: top 2009 trips in the UK and Ireland. This has been corrected.